Her eyes grew wide as she glanced at the knife in her hand. The red was dripping slowly from the tip to the floor as she watched the dead body fall from the chair. He had flown at her in one of his drunken rages and in her defense Tenley had grabbed the nearest object closest to her, the paring knife. Her father had come in reeking of booze from another fruitless night in search of her mother. She had vanished a few years ago leaving Tenley and her father to manage the debts that she had collected.

Captivated. That was how Tenley felt in that moment as she watched the drips land with a small splash onto the floor. It had taken her little to no thought to take her father's life. No one would notice for a few days that her father was missing work. Sometimes he went in and sometimes he didn't. So she could take her time with the clean up and leaving the home.

Where would I go? she wondered to herself as she cleaned up the blood with a mop. She had wrapped her father into a sheet and shoved him in a corner of the basement. It was no less than he deserved after each hell of her childhood that he had put her through.There were more days that she wondered if she would make it out alive and that was something no child should ever feel. Life was an unfair mistress and up until now it was a blow Tenley could not see.

Hurry. HURRY. The thought repeated through her head. She could feel the pressure suddenly of getting away from the house and the dead that invaded it. In a rush, she ran around for the cloths and buckets to wash up the blood. Couldn't leave it too easy for anyone coming into the house. Once it was cleaned she went upstairs to clean herself off, shove her clothing in the wood stove and pack up a suitcase to get out.

Silence. The eerie silence had gotten to her as she waited for the cover of dark. Once it arrived she was quick to slip out the back door and into the woods. Not being able to stop and needing to put the distance between the house and herself, she began to run. Once she began she was unable to stop. She ran and ran until she came to the big city of Chicago, many miles away from the small town she had come to grow up in.

Safety at last. The last thought she had when she gave the motel manager some cash and locked herself up in a room. This was a city she could lose herself in and no one could find her. Just another young homeless teen among the many others.